Check Your Head
by Rukafais
Summary: Shockwave is a hunted fugitive, now gone from Cybertron after being exposed; but when Cybertron Command sends a now-healed Blurr to chase him across the galaxy, they get far more than they ever bargained for. Alternate ending to TransWarped.
1. Prologue: When Darkness Falls

**prologue: When Darkness Falls**

It is dark, and a voice comes from the depths of the blackness, echoing on forever.

Calm, and cold; but almost amused. The _click-click-click _of claws against one another is the only other sound; somehow hypnotic and at the same time, terrifying.

A red light shines from the depths, too bright to behold.

"So you're out from the medbay at last, hmm?

Doesn't this sound familiar_?_

_Listen to me. There is something I want you to do..._"

All of a sudden, there is no longer silence, and quiet. Just screaming that goes on, and on, and on-

"-ake up!"

"W-what?" He didn't register the words at first, weakened blue optics squinting against the suddenly bright light and the faceplate that filled his vision. He just wanted to sleep, he had a headache and he'd had one of _those _bad dreams again... "Wha-what's happening I don't get it what's going on _what's happening_?"

"Someone slaughtered the Autotroopers guarding the High Council's chamber! Nobody _noticed_ - there was no alarm, so nobody knew! Anyone could have walked in there while they were having the meeting! They're rounding up _everyone _- they say one of us did it, or one of us must have _seen _something!"

Blurr sat up abruptly, shaking his head, still trying to make sense of the world. _What was going on?_

In his dizziness, he never noticed his servos were still slightly damp, as if he'd been scrubbing them clean.


	2. Chapter One: Lost Time

**i. Lost Time**

"Is this everyone?"

The clamour was confusing him. He had a processor ache and he'd had such an odd, horrible dream, and he'd just gotten out of medbay and all he _really _wanted to do was recharge some more, because he was tired and dazed and _instead_ of doing _that _he was being dragged along by _someone _probably Cliffjumper _as usual _and-

-well, he'd honestly lost where he was going with that sentence and didn't feel terribly inclined to grope around in his processor until he latched onto it again, because usually he never _did _that in the first place - he was _good _at concentrating on what he was thinking and saying, which was sort of the point of being given the ability to operate and talk at unusual speeds. If he'd kept stumbling over his words or forgetting what he was saying mid-sentence it wouldn't be very helpful, would it?

(Then again, other mechs remarked that Blurr being so much faster than everyone else made his attention to detail and memory redundant, as he usually said it all too fast to catch, but Blurr remarked in the privacy of his own processor that if they weren't able to catch it they simply just weren't listening hard enough.)

The intelligence agent assumed that 'everyone' was here, because there were so many 'bots and this definitely seemed to be enough to count as 'everyone'. Normally, he would be terribly worried about the whole thing and possibly firing off questions like some sort of eager fresh-from-the-academy interviewer that had their first job, but right here and now he _really wasn't in the mood. _

He fidgeted and fussed a little, but he was so drained from the trauma he'd undergone (it had been at least two weeks since that incident, but it felt like it had happened yesterday) and the parts they'd had to reconstruct for his partially-crushed body were still quite, _quite _sore at the joints, that he honestly couldn't muster any more energy to do much more than twitch occasionally, not without taking power from his processor and necessary internal functions.

Whoever was up front started to speak, and Blurr honestly tried to pay attention, but there was a niggling itch at the back of his processor - an urge, nothing more, just a desire to do something to make them be _quiet _so he could just go back to sleep, servos jerking slightly of their own accord, and for a moment he almost felt, in the brief second that transpired, he could just hold the speaker by the throat and push _just _hard enough to stop air cycling to their processor, watch them overheat, watch sanity and thought processes just boil away with the lack of air-

-he shrieked inwardly and pushed it away, horrified that he could even _think _of doing that. That incident must have taken more of a toll on him than he'd ever thought it would - he'd never thought like that before!

_Have you? You put it differently, but haven't you gotten this...annoyed before?_

He felt like snapping at himself, but that was ridiculous and childish and what was the point of telling himself off? It was just a passing urge, and surely wouldn't develop into anything more - ignoring it was probably the best way of getting it to go away, and nagging at it certainly wouldn't do much.

"-rest assured, we will find the 'bots who committed this crime-"

"-o need to panic-"

Blurr only caught snippets of the speech; he was more concerned with how the crowd was already murmuring resentfully among themselves, _as if we would do that_, and the speedster had been on the receiving end of a disgruntled mob more than once, and in all of those times the disgruntled mob had turned into a screaming mass of fury that made even the bravest soldier turn tail and flee because, really, when it came down to it, _what could you do against something that big? _Besides curl up and cry, of course, but that wouldn't do anything other than eventually get you trampled on, and that never helped.

And worst of all, everyone was getting _impatient. _That never ended well.

The mech up front seemed to be picking up on it too, as he started to look nervous and started stumbling over his words in his obvious haste to get away from the crowd before something else happened.

He finally finished (in a jumble of words nobody could quite pick up) and-

-well, Blurr was fast, but even he had to admit that was the quickest exit he'd ever seen from someone on a stage that high. The speaker had made it off the stage, out the door and probably down the adjoining hallway at an impressive speed.

The crowd milled around for a while, discussing what had just happened, before finally starting to break apart as other officials dismissed them or herded their subordinates back to their jobs, nudging small bunches of bots down corridors or into nearby offices. Blurr was just about ready to take another nap despite himself before his commlink buzzed, and he winced. He didn't mind the noise it made normally, but with a headache coming on the effect was magnified tenfold.

"_Agent Blurr, report to the command centre at once."_

Oh, _good. _It wasn't Sentinel this time.

(While Sentinel was his Superior -capital S optional depending on how charitable Blurr felt- and was technically supposed to be respected, it didn't mean he _liked _the mech; in fact, he found him abrasive and positively irritating at points, which was why he fired out his reports as fast as he dared go without Sentinel catching on that he was doing it _on purpose _-otherwise, this would probably earn him transform-ups and a couple of irritable smacks around the helm area- and practically bolted for his quarters once he was dismissed.

Fistpumping in the hallway once he was out of sight and out of range was an optional thing, but one he occasionally indulged in.)

But, no doubt Sentinel would be present anyway, so there was no point dragging his feet and moping about it; Blurr had never been one for moping about things anyway, or indeed staying focused on one subject for a longer time than he really needed to. Almost everyone said that he was unfocused and unable to really concentrate on anything; the intelligence agent kept to himself the things he'd found out while performing one task and intently listening to a conversation going on nearby.

Sometimes, being branded as 'unable to focus' was a good thing. It made others drop their guard.

All of this went through Blurr's processor in a handful of nanoklicks, and he moved on to wondering (at high speeds) what he was needed for, and from _that _he jumped onto the possible reasons he could have been summoned for, and-

He reached the entrance to the command centre and passed through it, still absorbed in considering the various possibilities. Reality chose that moment to give him a sharp smack, courtesy of another officer waiting for him.

"Agent Blurr!"

The blue bot yelped and immediately sprang to attention, instinctively snapping into a salute.

"At ease," the mech continued, and Blurr relaxed.

Well, as much as Blurr _could _relax, anyway. Even when he was tired, he was still twitchy and even more impatient to get things over with than usual, if that was at all possible for him.

"You are familiar with the Decepticon Shockwave, correct?"

"Yes sir. In fact I believe you know this already, seeing as he attempted to crush me and then incinerate me before fleeing, however I-"

The officer waved a hand, and Blurr fell silent, slightly mortified at himself. That processor ache really must be worse than he thought, if he was already running his mouth off like that!

But despite his mortification, there was a part of him that felt almost...resentful.

_Why would he ask something he already knew?_

"Yes. I was just clarifying. Now, an agent returning to Cybertron recently reported spotting Shockwave on the Hydrax Plateau - we're not getting our hopes up to find him just yet, though."

_Then why is he telling me?_

Blurr suddenly had a sinking feeling. _They aren't going to, are they...?_

"And that's where you come in."

The sinking feeling turned into a full-blown weight. The speedster felt like he was going to scream in frustration. On top of _everything else _he now had to worry about _this! _And why _him, _why did they have to pick the bot who _almost got crushed by him_, why why _why why __**why-**_

But he knew _why, _of course. He was the fastest one, good at tracking, and sending anybody with him would just result in him having to _slow down _which was why he always took solo missions and it was frustrating to slow down but but _but _this was _Shockwave_, and to himself he privately admitted that he continued to relive that memory of almost being crushed-

_the walls are closing in run run run __**run nowhere to run i'm going to die i'm going to die**_

**-**in an almost constant loop; sooner or later, whenever he recharged, it would come back to haunt him and he always, _always _jerked out of recharge just before the walls closed completely.

The memory terrified him, yes, although terrifying wasn't exactly the right word; it was just that he had never actually had a memory more traumatising than that one; it made sense that it continued to pop up on his processor, unwanted for.

And at the same time, part of him wanted to do nothing more than chase down Shockwave, without orders, find him _i will tear him apart for what he tried to do what he's done-_

-Blurr pushed that one singular thought away. He was an _Autobot, _and agents like him didn't take matters into their own servos, no matter what; they handed captured prisoners over to Justice. If the bots who captured Decepticons could decide whether they lived or died, it wouldn't be long before things started falling apart.

_But that's not what you believe, is it? You hate him. You hate him so much, you could kill him. You could do it. You know how to do it, you've seen it before. It would be easy just to say you offlined him in self defence, he attacked you first, you didn't have time to get the cuffs on before he was attacking you, you had to defend yourself._

He briefly caught what the rest of the officer had to say, but he knew what kind of things he had to do. The travel arrangements would be made; Hydrax Plateau, despite Blurr's speed, was too far to go on foot. He'd be dropped off with the necessary equipment, but this was a solo mission.

Later, when he was thinking everything over and running through his memory banks, he realised that the idea, that voice he had been trying to keep down in his processor, hadn't been using 'you'.

Blurr didn't want to think about what that might mean; now was not the time to have doubts.

He had a mission tomorrow.

**A/N: **And so ends the first chapter! I hope you enjoyed it.

As always, a disclaimer: Transformers Animated and all related characters do not belong to me. I'm just writing about them. |D


	3. Chapter Two: Run

**ii. Run**

_"Agent Blurr, we are approaching the drop-off point. Please stand in the appropriate area and await further instruction."_

The humming of the ship's engines still unsettled him somewhat; a constant, edging reminder of one of the few things able to match his speed. Aside from the pilot, he was the only one in the craft - which made sense, he supposed, as if it was going to just be him on a mission then there was really no reason to send along anybody else.

Despite the logical reasoning, he could have used the company. He was more highly-strung than ever, and talking non-stop, while irritating to almost everyone, gave him some small outlet for stress.

And the silence, frankly, unnerved him. In headquarters, constant chatter had become a backdrop in his daily life; something he always noticed was there, on a subconcious level. At some points, he'd even gotten a little fed up with the noise (it never stopped, because there were workers of all kinds clocking in and clocking out regularly, and the entire building was a buzzing mass of activity) and wished for silence, but now that it _was _silent, he realised the noise had been something he'd gotten used to.

In his line of work, there was always a certain amount of noise; not the echoes of engines and his own footsteps in the ship, or the dispassionate tone of the pilot's orders (which, even by Cybertronian standards, sounded _robotic_), but the clamour of battle or the voices of other soldiers.

Despite being annoyed by it on a regular basis, he found that he missed it right now.

And despite him pushing it away, the silence made his processor remember something else, not very long ago.

"_I can't catch you, but..."_

_He stopped, optics wide as the familiar noise of the tunnels closing - no longer just a sound, now it was something that terrified him in his core, now that he was in the tunnel, he'd seen the results of a mech who had tried to stay in there for a full day on a dare without telling anyone and __**he'd come out as nothing remotely resembling a mech**__ -_

_no no no no nonononono black walls black walls get it away from me i have to get out get out __**get out-**_

Mercifully, the recollection (it was too soon, there would never be a time where he was comfortable with even recalling it ever again) was cut off by the pilot's next command.

"_Agent Blurr, we are at the drop-off point. Please stand away from the docking doors and prepare to descend._"

On a standard mission, there was at least an 80% chance, given how hostile other inhabitants tended to be when they saw a Cybertronian ship (granted, this was mostly the Decepticons' fault, but it didn't stop other races slinging things at whatever ships they saw, regardless of faction symbol) and how dangerous the weather conditions were on most planets, that the soldiers and other personnel would have to be dropped off in this way.

And when they said it was a 'drop-off point' (a statement that struck fear into the spark of every Autobot, Autobots being naturally attached to the ground but not wanting to painfully be reunited with it at speeds that, while not exactly _fatal_, happened to cause a lot of dents upon arrival - not to mention an unsuspecting rookie, not properly instructed on how to land, could have their first drop-off point be their last) they weren't joking.

Unfortunately for everyone concerned.

Blurr didn't really _mind, _however; he'd been dropped off like this almost all the time, and had thus gotten used to it - and almost enjoyed it at points. It helped that his sleek armour and aerodynamic design effortlessly handled the extra speed and air resistance, giving him a fairly smooth drop down, and with his reflexes he could easily snap into a perfect landing a couple of nanoklicks before he hit the ground.

(He only knew this because he'd tried it once, on his first drop-off without an official standing by to watch. He'd been surprised at his own daring and how easily he'd managed it, but decided it would be better to follow the Rules after that.)

The docking doors opened with a rush of air, showing the terrain far below from - to most Autobots, hardened soldiers or not - a height that was, frankly, terrifying.

However, Blurr didn't even hesitate - better get it over with -, took a few steps back, and then leaped out of the ship - partially because he felt like it, partially because there were magnetic strips on the ship's underside that caught any soldiers who botched the jump or simply didn't jump far enough.

(Blurr had seen other Autobots who had done that. The resounding _thud _that sent a slight shudder through the floor had made everyone wince in sympathy.)

Gravity started pushing him downwards after about a nanoklick of weightlessness, and he fell alarmingly fast - and from a distance, it would have looked like the intelligence agent had simply swan-dived out of the docking doors, considering how he had repositioned himself.

With an ease only brought about by constant practice, he used his downward momentum to flip forward sharply when he was still a decent distance away from the impact point, turn a somersault in midair and land firmly on both stabilising servos in a crouched position.

There was a dull _thump _as he hit the ground, but nothing more than that; he was too light to make much of an impact on this kind of rocky soil.

He was just about to start his run towards Shockwave's last recorded location, bringing up the coordinates to refresh his memory, when the sound of jet engines overhead made a small part of his processor freeze in instinctive fear.

Jet engines meant fliers, fliers meant Decepticons, Decepticons meant _not friendly get out of there right now_. But out on this plateau, there was nowhere to "get out of" and go to. They were the same thing.

And no matter how fast he went, he was reminded of his shortcoming. He was the fastest thing on wheels, true - but the same didn't apply to the air. With some effort, an airborne Decepticon could keep pace with him - gaining more than enough space to either stop him in his tracks, bring him to ground, or - if there were enough of them - circle like vultures, taking their time, firing to incapacitate, not kill; wound a soldier until they could barely go on, where death was a mercy instead of a punishment. He'd seen it before, on other, less fortunate soldiers.

And very rarely, he was assigned to gather up what was left of them.

It wasn't pretty. It never was, after all; that was war.

(After a while, he'd stopped remembering the times he'd had to gather up broken parts, and by the time he made it back to what served as the mortuary, his servos were soaked in fluid that decidedly wasn't his.)

Blurr considered the options. Flat, barren ground; no cover; and yet if he stayed here he was a sitting duck - and there were cliffs, in the distance, where he was headed to anyway.

He made his decision and went from approximately zero to about 800 mph in the space of what would be called "really, really fragging fast", which wasn't all that large an amount of time.

His intakes cycled air furiously, up to three or four times faster than normal in order to keep his internal components from overheating, and he was literally just a blur as he sped across the dusty ground - kicking up a huge plume of dust as he went.

The intelligence agent was aware that, even if the Decepticons had been somehow dimwitted enough not to notice his landing, he had probably just broadcasted his presence just by sheer volume of dust.

(Secretly, he hoped that it had at least covered his soon-to-be assailants in a thick layer that would be hard to get off. It would buy him some time; it was hard to assess the situation when everything was a hazy brown.)

Distantly, his audios registered the sound of jet engines sputtering and whining, choking on dust, and then bursting into full, vengeful life - and getting much closer, very quickly.

He didn't have much time, and there wasn't much he could utilise around here - he had his melee weapon, of course, but he couldn't risk getting it stuck in an enemy's armor plating and have to struggle to get it free while he became a target - and he wasn't built to take hits.

His blaster would barely register on Decepticon armour - it was more of something used for distraction, as nothing could weigh him down too much; he had to maintain his aerodynamic shape and balance, after all, and he couldn't do that with bulky, high-power weaponry built into him.

There were a few things he _could _do, however. Most of them involved a lot of focus, keeping himself calm, and a hell of a lot of luck.

That train of thought was registered and comprehended in full in about two nanoklicks, and by that time the fliers had made up what little ground they had lost.

"Get ready for _pain_, Autobot!"

Blurr reacted without thinking - laser fire hit the ground, but he just simply wasn't _there _any more. Now was not the time to be thinking extensively about _anything _- it was a battle, and he was outgunned and outnumbered.

Laser fire from all three as they circled, flanking him, and he backed up, using short bursts of speed to get himself closer to where he wanted to go.

If he wanted to survive this, he'd have to be very, _very _careful, and _extremely _lucky.

Then he bolted for the cliffs, now a reachable target - the jets in close pursuit, and without missing a beat raced up the nearest vertical surface, going fast enough to temporarily fool gravity into thinking he was meant to walk on walls.

He kicked off at the last possible moment and the world _turned_, dizzyingly and terrifyingly fast, as he somersaulted in mid-air at a height that he was really sure no Autobot should ever be going to without supervision and assistance - he was just barely able to keep up with the speed of his turns as he kept pulling himself forward, and the frankly terrifying whine of what was probably an energy cannon was just barely heard over the rushing wind now filling his audios with static.

He uncurled from his tight ball and jack-knifed in midair, desperately jerking as much weight as he could away from the beam's trajectory as it fired - he felt the heat scorch past his legs and feet, almost unbearable.

Focus, focus, focus. _Don't think about how far you are from assistance or ground. If they catch you, they will kill you._

_But first, they must __**catch **__you._

A rapid-fire series of mental commands, everything falling into place as his processor continued to work overtime; there was a _whirr _as plating shifted to push his melee weapon into the right place, his body straining against the high wind as he fell and struggling to avoid the energy bullets being fired at him - he'd already sustained a few wounds, nothing serious; they'd just skimmed him.

He had to get this _exactly right, _and the consequences of what would happen if he didn't-

_**Now.**_

Blindly, trusting to his own instinct - his optics now registering nothing more than a dizzying kaleidoscope of colour - he brought the saw down and was rewarded with a sudden shriek of agony. Fluids splattered across his armor as the weapon continued to whirr, biting into metal-

-_it sickened him, just the thought of what he was doing but otherwise he'd be dead now-_

And here and now was the hard part. He was working with nothing else but this lifeline; and it had to work, otherwise the mission would be over before it even started.

He flipped upwards, straining to keep balanced on the fragile point that was his weapon, and slammed down with absolutely no idea of where he might land - he couldn't see right now, as his optics were still recalibrating from the start and stop.

There was a shudder beneath him and, as his optics flicked back online, he lashed out with the weapon again and the jet shrieked, instinctively plummeting into a dive.

He wasn't going to hold on and try to _ride_ the Decepticon - that was absurd, and most likely suicidal.

He was already crouched; it took a little bit more hurried maneuvering than he had been prepared to do, but there wasn't much time, and the others were already catching on -

-he kicked off and landed squarely on the next jet, stumbling a little as he landed, and as quick as he had hit he was gone, moving onto the final obstacle between him and where he needed to go.

It was about then that his luck ran out and the Decepticon that he was about to leap off of suddenly tilted sharply, obviously intending to make him slide off and fall from what would probably be an incredibly damaging height upon impact.

Metal shrieked on metal as Blurr did the only thing he could, already in an unstable position, which was stab wildly and hope with everything he had that the saw bit deeply enough for him to hang on.

Something burned past his exposed chassis and he bit back the scream building in his vocaliser as he just managed to yank his free arm out of the way, earning himself a searing pain in his right side as the beam ripped past.

"_Get __**him**__, you idiots, not me-"_

There was another piercing shriek, and the Autobot jerked to a sudden halt, hanging precariously once again on what appeared to be a jet rapidly approaching ground.

He gathered his pain-addled processor together (despite the wound not being fatal, it burned away constantly and with the amount of movement he was doing, it wouldn't let him forget about it any time soon) and acted.

Luck held, and he yanked his weapon out and _jumped, _running on air and desperately trying to work up enough momentum, please please _please _let this work -

-he hit the cliff-face with a jarring crunch of rock and kept running, darting up the vertical slope and away across the clifftops, eventually stumbling and skidding, face-first, to an undignified stop in the nearest patch of greenery that was sufficient to cover him.

The adrenaline buzz faded, and he suddenly became aware of how very _tired _he was, and all of a sudden those wounds he had sustained during the battle - and not just the one currently demanding most of his attention on the right side of his chassis - all started complaining at once.

There was only one explanation; he'd burnt himself out. That battle had taken far more out of him than he'd expected, and yet he was lucky to be alive.

He was too tired to move any further, and even if he _could _it wouldn't be exactly the best idea to travel further in the dying light with injuries; all he could do was curl up and hope the patch he was lying in was sufficient to hide him from any unfriendly optics. His injuries burned, little individual flares of pain in his processor, and his optics dulled, shutting off as he finally succumbed to exhaustion.

He never really registered, as blackness set in, the soft beeping of something that had been unearthed by his undignified fall earlier - something that contained a message.

There was a _click, _and as he slipped into recharge his subconscious mind couldn't help but overhear...

"_Agent Blurr, you have made it this far. Congratulations; you have passed this first test. Now, __**listen to me. There is something I want you to do**__..."_

Darkness fell swiftly, and without a sound.

Night closed in.

**A/N: FIGHTY TIME FIGHTY TIME BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD. Enjoy this fight scene, guys, because it's probably be going to be the only one he's getting for a while.  
(Well, the only one **_**on screen, **_**anyway.)**

**ANYWAY feel free to criticise or offer pleasant advice or otherwise say how much you like/hate/mildly object to/think I should stick things where things are not ever supposed to go! Mind you, as long as everything is worded politely, with reasons on why you don't like it, I am glad to take your suggestions into consideration. However, if you **_**politely **_**write about how I am a [_expletive of choice_] [_descriptive derogatory word of choice_] that should [_explicit verb_] a [_object of choice_], I will **_**very politely **_**tell you to [_verb_] a [_noun_] up your [_private part_] and [_expletive_] off.**

**I don't own Blurr or Transformers Animated - I am just expanding on their concepts and things. I also just write about them. Derp!**


End file.
